I found a wonderful die collection on AliExpress recently...205 PAGES of dies...but, I showed great self control and only purchased two...a neat little border of vases with plants, and a two feather set...cost? The Flower Vase border die was $4.99 and the two feathers, $2.99 (with free shipping!).

I know! I don't need new things, can't afford them, haven't space...yaddayaddayadda...(but it is lovely to get a little treat now and then, ne'st pas?)

Anyway, they arrived in their shabby packaging yesterday from their exotic locations and I couldn't wait to try them out...

This card has a die cut which has been coloured with Distress Inks, water colours, my Gansai Tambi Starry Colours paints and Twinkling H2o's...the sentiment has been stamped with a wet T H2o in Deep Coral.

Card detail...

This die cut is from a black card stock scrap, adhered to a Brusho print pulled from my stencil session the other day and adhered to a lime green card base...

I made a video of the quick process of making the card. View it here, or @ You Tube...

A lovely sunny morning has been replaced by a grey, overcast afternoon. Apparently we are to expect gale force winds across the State later this evening, along with more rain. I had better remind Tim to make sure his tomato seedlings are in their shade house with the front fastened tight, or they will be in next week before we are.

Better go, I am about to mix up the pizza dough...all the varied toppings are chopped sliced and in their individual containers in the fridge, and the six individual Nutella pudding ingredients are all sorted, chocolate sauce made, tuna dip prepared, table set, bathrooms cleaned, dishwasher emptied, drinks chilling...sigh...wish we had decided to go out for pizza.

​Oh, before I go...I came across this little poem, translated from a Tasmanian indigenous song by Fanny Cochrane Smith in 1903, and thought I would share it with you...

​The birds are whistling,The Spring is come, The clouds are all sunny,The fuchsia is out at the top,The birds are whistling,Everything is dancing,Because it's Springtime,Everything is dancing,​Because it's Springtime.

The story of the indigenous people who inhabited Tasmania before the European invasion is poorly understood by many...mainly due to the fact that the knowledge of the culture of these people was expunged, or simply ignored by the early settlers and those in authority as was the custom and practice of those days. In my case I was taught nothing as a school child within the public education system of the history of the indigenous people of Australia, except where they clashed from time to time with the new settlers. This I think continued until the slowly developing climate of reconciliation changed the way we think, talk about and acknowledge the often dreadful and mistaken dark deeds of settlement and the treatment of the local inhabitants.While a young school girl I learned an awful lot of European history and the history of Australia after the first voyages of exploration by Dutch explorers like Willem Janszoon and Abel Tasman and the English James Cook...I was taught nothing about the original inhabitants...any information I gained as a young person was from visits to the Hobart Museum and Art Gallery and the tales from my parents, particularly my father who was a bushman at heart, and in conversations with older locals on Bruny Island where my parents had a shack. I found this interesting and well composed discourse around these issues by Greg Lehman

It has often concerned me (vaguely), throughout my life that the indigenous history as I know it is almost solely based around recorded conflict and distress, that the rich cultural history of these people is almost unknown to me. Also, I have a sad feeling about my exclusion from gaining access to knowledge of aboriginal culture by the exclusivity and distancing of those claiming aboriginal descent today, even though this is a wholly understandable context, knowing of the long history of patronising disempowerment shown these people since settlement.

Meanwhile, I just love the simplicity of the little poem...how lucky we are that someone wrote it down...